Dissatisfaction with the DA...Guerra/Garza...One last go around the merry-go-round...

I predicted that the race for Hidalgo County District Attorney would be a close one. I also predicted that Rene Guerra would still be able to reach the 50% mark which would have eliminated the need for a run-off election. I honestly thought that he would. I was wrong. But enough eating crow, it's on to business. The business of politics, which is why I started this little blog in our corner of the world in the first place. As it turns out, The Monitor reports that Rene Guerra received only 45% of the vote, while Alma Garza received 32%. In political math that equals run-off. With Mauro Reyna out of the picture, does this spell doom for Rene Guerra. That depends on one thing-How many people will go vote in the run-off election. For Rene Guerra to be at 45%, he needs to make sure that the same people that went out yesterday, or took advantage of early voting, are the same people, in a big enough number, to take time out of their busy schedules and cast their ballot. Get involved in "the process" once again. For Alma Garza, her worries are two-fold. First, she has to make sure that the 32% of Hidalgo County citizens who voted for her will turn out, every single one of them, to vote for her again in the run-off. According to the same report in The Monitor, Mauro Reyna received 23% of the vote. This leads to Garza's second dillemma, or hope, depending on whether you view the proverbial glass as half-empty or half-full. This of course does not apply if you are going to vote for Rene Guerra, in which case, you have your own glasses to worry about. But I digress, and my point is that Alma Garza needs to make sure that she is able to sway the 23% of people who voted for Reyna into her camp. It will take a combined effort between Garza and Reyna, but I get the feeling that the most die-hard of Reyna voters did not want Garza to win in the first place. Then you will have to convince those people not to vote for Guerra, or while we're at it, vote at all. There's a definite feeling in the air that Hidalgo County voters want a new District Attorney, but is that air strong enough to go back to the polls when the time has come? Jesus, for those of us who like the thrill of a good ride, this one just keeps spinning, and spinning, doesn't it? Welcome to politics in 2006.